Richard Kachkar had 'break from reality' when he ran down cop: psychiatrist

Although forensic psychiatrist Lisa Ramshaw said she believes Mr. Kachkar was in the throes of psychosis when he took a stolen snowplow on a rampage through downtown streets two years ago, she cited “great inconsistencies” in his self-reporting.

“It may be that he just doesn’t want to remember,” she told jurors at Mr. Kachkar’s first-degree murder trial, noting the accused alternately claimed to remember nothing and divulged key details of the fatal chain of events.

“He is not easy to interview at any level,” Dr. Ramshaw testified, citing a “disorganized,” contradictory narrative. While feigned amnesia is a possibility, she said, psychosis can also interfere with the mind’s ability to process events.

In the weeks leading up to Sgt. Russell’s death, the court heard Mr. Kachkar had been behaving bizarrely, hopping from shelter to shelter, praising “white Jesus” and fixating on grandiose business plans that involved a partnership with socialite Kim Kardashian’s family. But on Jan. 12, 2011, he appeared to take a dramatic turn for the worse.

Fearful of the residents and “odd smells” inside the Queen Street shelter where he was staying, he said he felt an urgent need to escape, Dr. Ramshaw testified. That’s when Mr. Kachkar, barefoot and jacketless, ran into the icy winter’s night and stole an idling snowplow.

“[He said] he didn’t have a plan, didn’t know really what was going on, but just kept driving,” testified Dr. Ramshaw, who interviewed the accused shortly after his arrest.

Mr. Kachkar’s “flashes of memory” were jumbled, she said, but he recalled several key junctures of the two-hour rampage, during which he smashed into myriad cars before driving the snowplow straight at Sgt. Russell.

“He indicated that he was driving down a road he didn’t know… The police officer came and walked in front and started shooting,” Dr. Ramshaw testified.

The accused also recalled that as he drove, “cars started coming at him, trying to cut him off” — although various witnesses have testified to Mr. Kachkar’s erratic driving as he wove in and out of lanes on the wrong side of the road.

“He indicated that he did not intend to hit the police officer [and] he did not know that he was hurt,” Dr. Ramshaw said, adding Mr. Kachkar later expressed bewilderment and remorse for his actions.

‘My opinion is that he was suffering from a mental disorder. He was suffering from psychosis at the time’

Dr. Ramshaw said she believes Mr. Kachkar has an unspecified psychotic disorder that led to a “decline in function” over the years — one that became more acute around the mid-2000s, coinciding with his father’s death. From that point on, there was a downward drift in the accused’s financial management, interpersonal relationships and ability to retain meaningful employment.

“He was functioning marginally at best,” Dr. Ramshaw told jurors. The morning he ran down Sgt. Russell, Mr. Kachkar had broken from reality, she suggested.

“My opinion is that he was suffering from a mental disorder. He was suffering from psychosis at the time… He had a break from reality which was over an extended period of time,” Dr. Ramshaw testified, supporting the defence argument that Mr. Kachkar is not criminally responsible. “He was more likely than not unable to assess the wrongfulness [of his actions].”

Dr. Ramshaw, who was selected by the defence to analyze Mr. Kachkar, is the second of three psychiatrists testifying at his trial. Last week, a Crown-selected forensic psychiatrist suggested Mr. Kachkar may be schizophrenic.

Both doctors have agreed Mr. Kachkar’s psychotic disorder did not “fit neatly” into any known paradigm. Dr. Ramshaw described Mr. Kachkar as frequently incoherent, unreliable and prone to speaking in a “child-like” voice. He also had a tendency to view the world with stark polarity: When he was feeling good, everything adopted rose-coloured hues, but when he was upset, he dwelt in negativity.

“He tends to shape the world one way or the other in any given moment,” Dr. Ramshaw said.